


Softly, Hungrily, Sincerely

by doodleishere



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Season 5 Spoilers, a Romantic Moment, a soft moment, catra and adora have a Moment, dream - Freeform, i finished the show and i am sad, please do not read if you have not watched season 5, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:07:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24489469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doodleishere/pseuds/doodleishere
Summary: Catra and Adora have a moment.
Relationships: Adora & Catra (She-Ra), Adora/Catra (She-Ra), catradora - Relationship
Comments: 6
Kudos: 194





	Softly, Hungrily, Sincerely

**Author's Note:**

> there are some spoilers for season 5 so like if you have not seen it then i guess maybe probably don't read this :)

Adora is an idiot.

A beautiful, defiant, magical, sometimes-transforming-into-an-eight-foot-tall-lady kind of idiot, but an idiot nonetheless. Catra knows this. Catra has always known this. Catra has proven this small fact about Adora more times than she can count.

So why is Catra the one who feels stupid right now?

“No,” she manages to push out of her throat. “No, Adora, _no_.”

And Adora’s—no, _She-Ra’s_ —just looking at her with this lopsided grin on her face like she _knew_ that Catra wasn’t going to figure it out until it was too late, and her eyes are looking at her as gently as bright glowing eyes can. She-Ra is in front of Catra, and Catra is an _idiot_.

“Adora,” she whispers, useless hand reaching out. Uselessly. (Adora knows Catra too well. She used her stupid shiny sword as soon as Catra got here to start a fire between them that Catra knows would incinerate her the second she touched it. Adora’s an idiot, but she’s not _stupid_.) “Adora, _please_ , you can’t do this.”

“I have to, Catra,” She-Ra says, voice booming against the walls around them. She-Ra’s voice is just as big as the rest of her is. It’s a voice fit for starting and ending wars, and it looks like Adora’s finally figured that out, because she’s using it to drive a rift between them that Catra won’t be able to fix. After everything, after Shadow Weaver and the Rebellion and Horde Prime and _the Heart_ —they’ve been through all of that, and Adora is the one that’s breaking them beyond repair.

“You don’t.” Catra takes a step towards the flames burning in front of her, a small and tentative thing just to test the waters, and she sees a flicker of worry dash across She-Ra’s eyes before they’re back to looking gentle and knowing and smooth. If she wanted to, Catra could throw herself into it before Adora got the chance to do what she came here to do. Catra wouldn’t have to watch it. She’d be gone, and Adora would have to live with the fact that _she_ was the one who forced her hand. Adora and her fucking alter ego.

“Catra,” and she almost flinches at the way She-Ra says her name, like she’s trying to cradle it in her mouth one last time before she goes (don't go _, don't go),_ “I do. This is what I was always supposed to do. My destiny wasn’t just to save Etheria—it was to save _this universe_.”

“How can you know that?” Catra shrieks. There’s tears in her eyes, and _fuck_ , Catra is an _idiot_. “How can you know that _you’re_ the one who has to save this place? Why can’t it be someone else, Adora?”

She-Ra steadies in front of Catra, muscles awash in magic flame. She’s as beautiful as ever. Catra feels her heart start to throb inside her chest looking at her. “Because there _is_ no one else. No one but She-Ra can possibly do this.”

She-Ra, the hero.

She-Ra, the unstoppable.

Made of Adora, the breakable.

“Do you remember the Heart, Adora?” Pleading is useless, Catra knows; she’s been there. She’s done that. Pleaded and pleaded and pleaded with Adora until she was blue in the face and Adora was long past gone from her. Pleading with her now...it reminds her of when she found Adora in that small village already half-convinced that the Horde was evil. It didn't work then, not after She-Ra came into the picture. But it’s all she’s got now. Love didn’t do the trick. So pleading it is. “Do you remember me asking you to stay, and you actually _staying_? Please, Adora. Do that again. Just _stay with me_ , Adora. _Please_.”

And there it is, that smile. That damned gentle smile. That damned _Adora_ smile, stuck onto _She-Ra’s_ body. It breaks Catra in two. “I want to stay, Catra. But you know me. I have to do this. I have to be the hero.”

Catra squeezes her eyes shut. She doesn’t have to see it. She doesn’t have to see the woman she loves self-destruct or light herself on fire or whatever it is she’s convinced herself she’s got to do in order to save another world. Adora, always convincing herself and everyone around her that _she’s_ the one who’s got to do it all. Adora, the fucking _traitor_. The love of Catra’s entire cursed life.

Catra feels her knees give out beneath her; she doesn’t care. Just slips to the cold stone floor with a _thump_. She bends her head down, forces two quick breaths in, then raises her eyes to look into She-Ra’s one last time.

“There’s no talking you out of this,” she says quietly. “Is there?”

She-Ra’s eyes snap back to Adora’s colors, just for a second, and then they’re back to She-Ra’s dazzling blue. Catra prefers the other. “No,” she replies. “There’s not.”

“Not even if I tell you that I love you,” and she says it without the lilt of a question mark. Because she already knows the answer, doesn’t she? It’s right there in front of her, spelled out in magical flames that tower over her head.

She-Ra ( _Adora_ ) smiles with her lips closed. “Not even then.”

Catra forces herself to gulp down the bile rising up in her. Adora is going to die. The girl she spent entire revolutions trying to bring back to her—that girl is going to die. And there is nothing that Catra can do about it.

“I love you,” she moans.

“I love you too,” She-Ra says, and then she swings her sword into her own chest as Catra watches and screams.

▼

Catra wakes up with Adora’s hands tightly wrapped around her arms.

“Catra?” Adora asks, all fear and love and pain. “Catra, are you okay?”

Catra blinks everything into focus, and the image of a dying She-Ra shimmers and dissolves as other things take its place. A room in a castle. A scared looking Adora. A sky full of stars falling in from the window.

“Adora?” she breathes, hardly letting herself believe that she’s real.

“Catra, it’s me,” Adora says, and then Catra’s clinging onto her like it’ll save her life. Like it’ll save _Adora’s_ life. She buries her head into the spot between Adora’s neck and shoulder and breathes her in, inhaling the familiar scent of woods and sweat and magic, and it’s not enough. It’s never enough. No amount of Adora is enough for her.

“I love you,” she mumbles into Adora’s skin. Tears start to fall out of her eyes, but she can’t do anything to stop them, so she just lets them pour.

“I love you too, Catra,” Adora says, arms encircling Catra like they’re never going to let her go. Catra likes being held like this—needs it. The only place she knows Adora is safe is with Catra. As long as Catra is holding her and Adora’s holding back, Adora is _safe_. She can’t go sacrificing herself or launching She-Ra into the next war someone decides to wage if she’s stuck in Catra’s arms. She can’t leave if she’s trapped with Catra, chest to chest.

“Catra,” Adora whispers into her ear, her voice scratchy and soft in all the right places. The way she says Catra’s name is unlike anything else. It’s a way that only Adora could ever say it. It's hungry and wanting and—and—and more than Catra knows how to deal with. She says it like Catra’s special. “Did you have another nightmare?”

Catra thinks her silence is answer enough. She tightens her grip on Adora, claws digging lightly into the sleep clothes Adora’s wearing. (She’d never hurt her. Not intentionally. Not again. Not—not ever again, not if she can help it.)

There is a pause that Catra knows is Adora gearing up to say something. She breathes into it, letting herself sink into Adora’s body before she speaks again. “Was it—was it about me?”

“Yeah,” Catra barely lets out. The word scrapes at her throat, and it’s the first time that she realizes that she probably woke up Adora by screaming. (How many times can she do that before Adora leaves her? Sixty-four times isn’t enough. How many more times can Adora take? How many times before Adora’s gone again?)

Adora’s arms stiffen around her. All hard muscle and bone against Catra’s skin and fur. Even when she’s not She-Ra, she’s built to last. Built to topple empires and knock down regimes and—

And hold Catra until she’s calm again.

“I am so sorry, Catra,” and she says it how she always says it, which is to say that she says it like she means it. “I wish that I could make them stop. But I’m not leaving you. I promise.”

Catra peels herself back, just for a second, just to take a look into Adora’s eyes. Just to see the sincerity shining in them. See the love and sadness gleaming back at her, too. And then she can’t look away because this is _Adora_. Vibrant, strong, lovely Adora, whose heart aches at the fact that she can’t fix the thing inside of Catra that she broke.

“Promise me again, Adora,” she says. “Please.”

“I promise. I am never leaving you again, Catra. _I promise_.”

Catra allows one side of her mouth to curl up. “Good.”

Adora’s lips find Catra’s in the night air, and the kiss is full of a gentle heat that Catra yearns to uncover. She pushes her mouth hard against Adora’s, opening herself up for a challenge, and Adora answers, all strength and power and want. Catra allows herself to be leaned back and relishes the pressure of Adora on top of her before she flips them over in one fluid motion.

“You stay here,” she growls into Adora, “safe beneath me.”

“Whatever you want, Catra,” Adora whispers into Catra’s ear as Catra begins to trail kisses along Adora’s neck. (She absently thinks about how much she wanted to kiss those places back when they were with the Horde. How she longed for this more than she realized before Adora had left. How she was scared the first time Adora had let her do this, like it was all some dream and she’d wake up back at the Horde, alone. Then Adora’s hands are on her, and it’s hard to think anything at all.)

“I love you,” she says. Softly. Hungrily. Sincerely.

Adora stares into her eyes, and Catra never wants her to stop. Because if Adora keeps looking at her like this, she thinks she’ll be set for the rest of her life. If Adora keeps looking at her like this, she thinks that maybe—maybe Adora will never let her go.

“I love you too,” Adora says back. Softly, Catra notes. Hungrily. Sincerely.

**Author's Note:**

> i started watching the show a few days ago and finished it yesterday and i am........UPSET. I LOVE THEM ALL SO MUCH.


End file.
